The Physics Alive Podcast
Episode #31
Labs: Stop Verifying and Start Investigating with Natasha Holmes
Natasha Holmes, Assistant Professor at Cornell University, studies teaching and learning in physics and other STEM courses, especially the efficacy of hands-on laboratory courses. She asks: How do we know what labs are achieving? And, what teaching methods improve outcomes? Today, she’ll share what we should stop trying to do in lab and what we might try instead.
Today's Guest:
Natasha Holmes
Today I’m speaking with Natasha Holmes, Ann S. Bowers Assistant Professor at Cornell University. She arrived at Cornell after two years as a postdoc at Stanford University and earning her Ph.D. in physics at the University of British Columbia. Her research lab broadly studies teaching and learning in physics and other STEM courses. But she has a passion for investigating labs. Her group’s largest research focus is on the efficacy of hands-on laboratory courses. They ask: How do we know what labs are achieving? And, what teaching methods improve outcomes? By probing these two research questions, they aim to better understand what labs should be aiming to achieve.
Learn more about Natasha Holmes and her work:
Episode Notes and Resources
Selected articles authored and co-authored by Natasha Holmes
- 2021 – Best practice for instructional labs
- 2019 – Operationalizing the AAPT learning goals for lab
- 2018 – Intro Physics Labs: We Can Do Better
- 2018 – Value added or misattributed?
- 2013 – Teaching Assistant professional development by and for TAs
Links to other articles and resources mentioned in the episode
- Natasha’s PhysPort materials: Thinking Critically in Physics Labs
- Article on LED’s by Eugenia Etkina and Gorazd Planinsic (1st in series of 4)
- AAPT Recommendations for the Undergraduate Physics Laboratory Curriculum